Jack's Radio
by FrancescaElba
Summary: This is a pre-tribe i wrote a while back about why Jack was obsessed with his short-wave radio in the beginning of the first season


Jack's Radio

A despondent ten year old Jack stood firmly and gallantly alongside his weary-faced, brokenhearted mother, trying his utmost to exude a look of confidence and self-assurance he simply didn't feel. Lacing his mother's icy fingers with his own, he gave her hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze, silently encouraging her to move on from her father's open casket.

Others were there to view the body as well, and they had been standing in front of it long enough.

_It wasn't the virus_, Jack silently repeated to himself, the words that his mother tried to convince herself of over and over again. It was just his time.

Grandda had been a sick man for as long as Jack had known him. Schizophrenia had claimed his mind over thirty years ago. Diabetes had claimed his body for eight; and in only one short week, the virus had finally claimed his soul.

…Not the virus, Jack reminded himself. It was simply his time.

Looking up at his mother's sullen face, her body rigid as it lingered for too long in front of the casket, Jack, with a courage and strength he didn't realize he possessed, gave his mother's hand a firm tug and drew her away from her father's lifeless body.

Just as was expected of him, just as was always expected of him, Jack chivalrously assumed his role as comforter. When it came to his mother grieving her father, it was a recurring role for Jack. Despite his being only ten years of age, he seemed to find himself constantly being cast as such.

Jack would always find himself championing his grandfather for his mother's sake. Against the whispers of the small town, against the mean and unfounded rumors that floated in the air, and, at times, against his own shallow-minded, self-centered father, even.

Grandda had been sick, not crazy. Patience, sympathy, pity for the ill-minded was something that didn't seem to exist in Jack's small world. And because of the lack of compassion on the part of the people, his grandfather had become the laughingstock of the neighborhood. In time, gossip graduated to slander, and the old man's eccentric but harmless behavior was labeled a threat, and Jack's mother was shamed.

Jack could see the shame in her eyes now as she bowed her head and resumed her seat in the nearest cold, hard pew. She hadn't been the only one shamed and effected by the gossip. Grandda had been forced into a life of recluse his final years.

Locking himself in his room for days on end, hushed but audible voices permeating the room, filtering through the shut door, no one had to guess at what Grandda was doing behind closed doors. He had been doing it for years. Fifteen, to be exact, ever since his wife passed.

Fiddling with his old shortwave radio he kept hidden under his bed, tuning in to forbidden stations asking anyone he could get in contact with if they'd seen his wife. Red hair, brown eyes, petite and the love of his life was always the description he gave.

And when a woman's ethereal voice would transmit and float from the speakers, Jack could hear the hopeful and tear-filled voice of his grandfather as he asked solemnly if it was she. To Grandda, she was simply lost. And his obsession to find her only served to draw a deep wedge between Jack's mother and father until the maddening sound of the radio reached a crescendo, ending with his father's final exit.

Two years had passed since Jack had last seen his father the day he stormed out of the house. He had taken the radio with him out of spite, and Jack's mother was sure that that was what killed her father in the end.

Not this crazy virus. This virus that, in a few days time, would force her to put her only son on an evacuation bus.

Martial law was declared. Children were believed to be carriers and so a separation would have to take place. Jack was willing to go. Anything to keep his mother alive.

And he'd made a promise to Grandda that he would do so. The day before he died, his Grandda had made him promise that he would leave if it was necessary. Jack had been stunned, for his grandfather had hardly spoken more than five words since the day the radio was taken from him. And so, out of pure shock if nothing else, Jack had made the promise.

And he intended to keep it. He would leave for his mother's safety. He would leave because of the promise he'd made to his Grandda.

Jack reached for his mother's hand again and rested his head against her shoulder.

"You know what the last thing Grandda said to me was, Ma?" he asked in a small voice, quiet so as not to disturb the wake.

Tears streaming down her cheeks, Jack's mother turned to him and smiled.

"What did he say, Jackie." She whispered.

Jack squeezed his mother's hand.

"He told me to keep in touch. Isn't that funny Ma." He stated.

Jack's mother placed an arm around his shoulders.

"Yeah, Jackie. It is."


End file.
